The official provided the information on background. Last month, news leaked the president was considering Foxx, a Democrat and two-term mayor.

Foxx knows Washington, and the president, well. He made several trips to the White House before and after Charlotte landed the 2012 Democratic National Convention. Early in his career, Foxx worked on the staff of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee and in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

This would be — by far — the biggest job of Foxx’s career. He is a part-time mayor in a city government with a budget of less than $2 billion and about 7,000 employees. At the Department of Transportation, he would preside over 55,000 employees, a $70 billion annual budget and responsibility for roads, rail, aviation and maritime transportation.

If confirmed by the Senate, the Charlotte mayor would replace Ray LaHood, a former Illinois congressman. Foxx would not be the first person to make the leap from mayor to transportation secretary. Former Denver mayor Federico Pena did so in the Clinton administration.

Charlotte last had a high-ranking official in the White House in the late 1990s, when Erskine Bowles was chief of staff in the Clinton White House. Bowles, an investment banker, earlier led the Small Business Administration during the Clinton administration before later working as deputy chief of staff from 1994 to 1996 and then serving as chief of staff from 1997 to 1998. He is best known for playing a key role in balancing the federal budget. Another North Carolinian, former U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole, was U.S. secretary of labor from 1989 to 1990 under President George H.W. Bush.

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